So
fly with someone else
On May 21, Ryanair insisted that all new bookings would require online check-ins. If you don't print your boarding pass from the company's website, you're charged an extra £40. And now the Irish budget airline has announced that for ten hours next week, its website will be completely unreachable. The Ryanair site will be …
Forget website availability, when does a surcharge stop being a surcharge and start becoming an immoral con trick?!
Used to be I'd have believed the 1p fares were balanced by people booking outside of sales or close to flight departure dates (hello fellow business travellers), but now it seems that the price balance is being covered based on how many of the increasingly large number of "options" you are presented with when booking.
Why £40 to print a ticket? It's not to cover the costs of paying ground staff because the staff have to be there, how else to surcharge over the odds when you turn up at the airport having forgotten that you agreed to wear flip-flops instead of the DMs you dressed in that morning? Perhaps it's the printing costs, and to that I'd suggest Ryanair should switch to printers that don't require original Shakespeare manuscripts and use ordinary A4 like the rest of the world.
If your entire operation can only be accessed through a website, you'd better make dam' sure that website is 100% reliable. With online shopping, the risk is less - as you retain the stock if people can't buy it. Businesses like airlines and hotels deal in a very perishable commodity: one that ceases to exist, once it's day has passed.
Therefore for an e-commerce site to be down is bad news for the retailer, but it's a total disaster for an airline that has put all it's eggs in one, online, basket.
You'd have hoped that RyanAir would have realised just how exposed they are to any failure from their web services and would have a hot/warm standby, or D.R. system that was capable of taking the strain when their main soite was down. If this report of a total outage is true, it seems that they are pursuing a very risky strategy of a single point of failure.
I wonder if the stock holders know .how vulnerable they are ....
"Ryanair has told those traveling on Thursday the 25th that "in order to avoid any inconvenience," they must do their web check-in before 6pm Wednesday the 24th."
If you've any sense, you'd do that anyway. Leave things until the last minute, and you're asking for trouble.
What if your PC, router, or printer, goes tits-up, and you've no time to get it sorted?
... and if people don't like it they should book with another airline.
I think Ryanair's attitude is a disgrace but ultimately they're there to make profits and they'll go on making profit as long as they can. The only way to make them rethink is to put that profit at risk is by choosing to fly with airlines which don't place so many onerous obligations on the paying customer.
...That said I sometimes have to fly to Brno in the Czech Republic and Ryanair is the only airline that flies there direct so I grudgingly book...
"Why £40 to print a ticket? It's not to cover the costs of paying ground staff because the staff have to be there"
Err, you obviously haven't travelled with them recently - the Ryanair check-in desks are no longer staffed at Stanstead. There are one or two staff at the "customer service" desk, but not a lot else...
Last time I compared Lyin'Air with British Airways to somewhere (I think it was Barcelona), BA were CHEAPER. And that included flights into the city itself, not "London" Stansted to "Barcelona" Reus (both 100km from their respective cities).
I imagine Mickey O'Leary likes talking up his 'cheap' tickets so much because ... well ... they aren't that cheap once you factor in sensible things. Like luggage. Toilets. Passing through the airport, that sort of thing.
The company is despicable - got its hand in just about every pie around. The profits come from abusing staff and customers, bending rules and huge tax subsidies from regional governments foolish to believe that airport jobs = tax income. Still as long as they can get away with it they're doing nothing wrong.
*Definitely first against the wall when the time comes.
Flew with them once, and found a bunch of unauthorized charges on my credit card when the statement came the next month. After months of letters to the credit card company I finally got the money back, but if I took my time into account I could have hired a private jet......
Avoid these crooks at all costs
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I forget - are they the ones with the hideous purple and yellow interior, guaranteed to ruin your retinas? Not to mention the "pay for a p!ss" scheme they floated once.. How on earth is peeing and having a ticket a "frill"??
Just goes to show, you really do get what you pay for. BA all the way.
I've only used Ryanair once but that was once too often.
The web site would not accept online check-in for one of our party, so, surprise, money was needed to "re-open the booking reference". Same again on the return trip.
Ryanair treats customers as a hideous inconvenience. This doesn't have to go with the low-cost concept. When I flew with FlyBe it was a surprisingly pleasant experience.
...this is RyanAir we're talking about!
Why people fly with that company, I'll never understand. It's not like they're that much cheaper than their competitors, especially when you consider all the 'non-optional extras' that they charge an arm and a leg for, in order to drive down the headline price.
The first person to pee or take a dump in the aisle because they didn't have the right currency for the toilet would make them change their minds.
Makes one think, do these toilets take, pounds, euros or any other currency in western Europe?
Knowing Ryanair thou' they'd give free coffee and lace it with laxatives...
The booking system runs on .NET.
My guess is that the developers have found it impossible to move the site to another server - so they're going to update a single live server. Someone's promised that ten hours should do it.
I wouldn't wish the worse on anyone - and have no axe to grind with Ryanair - but this looks extremely risky. My main worry would be that the site could be down for a long time - and could end up borked completely.
I know at the beginning Michael Ryan boasted that he turned down an initial offer to build the site for a few mill - and paid a bunch of students about 24k instead. Now, paying a few mill to salesmen with PPS slides only guarantees that you're going to spend a few mill - but inexperienced programmers can cause many problems. These may not be apparent initially but will cause problems in the end.
The problem here is that if RyanAir refuses to climb down on this truly horrible idea, we'll start seeing it at other airlines too - *especially* those that retain counter staff and can therefore weasel a justification for the 40 quid...
Paris because we'd all like to go there cheap, if we'd just admit it.
This is the fault of the idiot customers. If they choose to fly with an airline which puts tiny cost savings over a decent service, then they are helping that airline and it's model grow to dominate the industry. I'm glad they're installing coin slots on the toilets - it makes it more clear what the choice is. You either pay for a basic modicum of comfort, or you race to screw down the prices as low as possible.
Recently had to book a flight with RyanAir (no other direct flights for less than £300) and the price originally came out at £200 for ticket, taxes and surcharges.
Then, on the payment page it had gone up to £268. I checked the charges and it turns out there are several added extras that aren't optional. Two that caught my eye were "hold-baggage" for around £40 (apparently you have to pay, even if not taking any!) and "online check-in" for £10 (or an extra £40 at the airport). Pardon me, but surely checking in isn't an optional extra, so if they have to charge for it* why the feck isn't it included in the ticket price?
*what exactly do you need to pay for? Checking-in online barely costs them anything, surely? I can understand a charge for checking-in at the airport (extra personnel etc.) but not for online.
Teeves, de lot o' dem.
Why anyone bothers with Pikey Air I don't know. BA flights are (most of the time) well priced and competitive. I used to have to travel to Exeter from Glasgow a lot and FlyMaybe flights would cost £180! Hardly budget prices. It was cheaper for me to go to Paris.
Anyway, personally I'd rather pay a fair price for a flight than 99p plus bolt ons, restrictions, penalties and being treated like a problem rather than a customer.
"Ryanair will review the number of passengers who fail to check-in online and make a decision at that time."
translate:
if only a few people miss online checkin: not much money in it, waiving £40 will be good publicity
if loads of people miss online checkin: f*** publicity, take £40 from everyone and laugh all the way to the bank
Ryan Air seems to have quite a few IT problems that result in just another few quid of charges to the dear customer. The only time I ever flew with them, they didn’t send out the confirmation Email. They have no email address on their web page, just an expensive premium rate number. On calling this you hear the customary message in 2-3 languages telling you how expensive the call is before being dumped in the wait queue. They also mentioned that it was quite common for emails to get stuck in their system. Oh, those niggling IT problems. Ker-ching.
I cannot see the justification for all the hate towards this company. They have given advance notice to their customers of necessary work which may impact service and scheduled this work so it will impact as few people as possible. Why do so many of you have a problem with this?
I will continue to consider RyanAir when making travel plans.
On some routes (and Brno would be my example too, funnily enough...) they're the only game in town. Not that their attitude makes it clear that they KNOW they have a monopoly or anything...
Utter bastards. Dreadful customer service. I avoid them whenever possible, and am disappointed when it's impossible...
OK so it's official then we (nearly) all detest Eire o' Flot (hat tip AC) for their attitude towards their customers and staff, and the way they will do anything to shave off a buck or increase yet another additional 'optional' extra
They've even brought down their only means of making money for 10hours presumably so they could save a few quid on having to use redundant systems etc right in their customers face - boy are they serious about saving money or what?!
My point is - what about the savings you can't see, like does the guy who checks the wheel nuts are tight, that the fuel gauge is correct and that the crazy glue on the wings has set properly still do his job?
When their planes nose dive into the ground will we be told this was because the passengers didn't pay the hidden 'optional' mechanical check surcharge?
Never had a flight cancelled. Always landed on time or early. Found the staff no worse than the sour-faced bitches BA exclusively employ. Never paid more than £10.00 to fly anywhere (including credit card fees - get an Electron card you dummy) and have enjoyed day trips to Berlin, Dublin, Belfast and Pisa for 2p return.
Website is, however, totally shit. Let's hope it's down for 10-hours so they can post up a decent effort.
* Brilliant name!
Given that you can check-in up to fifteen days before departure I fail to see how this is such a big deal. That said, most RyanAir passengers are idiots.
RyanAir prices are cheap. Way better than what you'd get with BA as long as you book far enough ahead. However, as someone who flew with RA earlier this month it's an airline I certainly won't be using again - they play a celebratory fanfare on landing!
You don't pay for hold baggage if you're not taking any.
Re. the "mechanical check surcharge" - very funny. That sort of "extra" is outside RyanAir's control - if they don't do it, they don't fly. Simples.
I took my mum on a day trip to Dublin last year, using Ryanair. I admit the service/facilities were basic at best, but the 20-minute flight was well and truly made by my mum questioning: "Did we get these flights for 1p because they use old planes?" For very short flights they're not too bad, but I'd never use them for anything else.
...back in May. It was either go with them, or travel an extra 50 miles to another airport as we were going to Prague for a conference.
Yes we were required to print out our boarding passes or pay £40. Its quite bizarre actually, no check in desk queues, just pass thru security and turn up at your gate with your priority queue ticket - you're on the plane in no time! It actually streamlines the whole process! But Ryanair trying this downed-website thing on people is indeed quite idiotic!
I have to say, apart from a malfunctioning website which crashed out whilst buying the tickets, and then wouldn't accept some input options when going to print out our boarding passes (ups the anxiety levels a bit!), the experience at the airports, Prague and Birmingham, was reasonably smooth what with the accidental streamlining they've achieved!
And yes it beat KLMs processes, British Airways processes, and of course that time when our EasyJet flight to Amsterdam was turned back to Luton airport because of a dead battery (so they tell us). Quickest descent I've ever felt in an aeroplane and I'm still alive!
The fire trucks surrounding our aeroplane, as it rolled into a secure fireproof area, was quite disconcerting too!
Now call me naive if you like, but wasn't the point of "check in" supposed to be a stage that allowed the airline to know if you'd actually turned up and would be taking your seat - as well as taking your baggage etc.
If you check in online, why have an extra step at all - surely the fact that you bought a ticket is enough, and "checking in" simply prints a different bit of paper. Why not, and I know this could be a strange concept to people that have never used a train for example, just use the ticket as a "boarding pass" ?
i take it you don't book many flights then. just yesterday i booked a return flight to prague, only 2 weeks in advance - £13.70 for flights and taxes, a tenner to pay with my card (GAH) - total cost £23.70. Ok, so there seemed to be some kind of a special offer on, but still - a bargain.
Having said that, I'm flying with no hold bags, their seats are ruinously close together if you're 6ft tall or above etc etc. You do have to play their game and jump through plenty of hoops, and if I wasn't a healthy, twentysomething bloke travelling on my own it would probably be a whole different kettle of fish.
They're still twats though.
"Is there a route on which the taxes cost £20 to £30? Even one, let alone enough to justify the "usually" comment?"
Is there a route (within Europe) where the taxes cost less?!
The first one I checked, Aberdeen to Dublin, taxes are £30.16
Next up, Luton to Girona, taxes are £24.03
Next, Gatwick to Cork, taxes are £28.05
etc...
1. 1p flights are never 1p
Even if you strike it lucky and find a 1p flight you actually want to take, Ryanair charge you for the pleasure of paying for it. To the tune of £4.75. For each passenger. Each way.
And that doesn’t even include…
2. The check-in charge
If you want to book a bag into the aircraft hold you must check in at the airport, which will cost you £4.75 per passenger, per way, if you book online and a whopping £10 per passenger, per way if you pay at the airport or over the phone. And it doesn’t matter if only one person in your party takes a bag, everyone else still has to pay to check in at the airport too.
3. The baggage charge
Which is an extortionate £9.50 per bag, per flight. Or £19 if you book at the airport or over the phone.
4. The sneaky weight limit
Ryanair set its weight limit for hold luggage at 15kg catching the majority of passengers off guard.
You’re not allowed to pool bags either so, even if you have a party of four sharing luggage, if the bag weighs 16kg you will be charged £14 per additional kilo. Nevermind that it makes not a jot of difference to the weight of the aeroplane.
5. The additional baggage charge
Probably best to wear all of your clothes at once on the flight if you are travelling somewhere for more than a couple of days (until Ryanair start charging passengers for excess body weight that is). Check more than one bag in and it will cost you another £19 per extra piece of luggage, per way.
With thanks to The Times online
@AC 11:13 GMT - Read The Posts.... or even look at Eire O'Flot / Lyin Air / Swine Air / Ruin Air 's web shite, eh web site (should be in the .con domain), online check in €10, Payment Handling Fee €5 & checked baggage fee €20 - all one way, add government taxes and airport charges and a "free" flight will cost you €60+
Also, do a bit of research on what the government and airport taxes and charges are, scum-air charge more.
I've just tried to book a 'free' flight (internal in Ireland), 1 bag to check in, total cost €50.
I do sense a business opportunity though, a kiosk in the airport with a PC and a printer, €10 per printed page.....
Website down for 10 hours, hmmm… and a website is a lot less complex than an airplane............
> When's the last time a Ryanair plane came
> anywhere close to 'nose diving into the ground'?
Last time I flew them was straight after they'd replaced 2 tires that burst after a hard landing.
http://www.limerickleader.ie/shannon/Ryanair-flight-in-tyre-scare.4994432.jp
We could see the chalk marks on the tires. Landed in Galway an hour later and the pilot drove the plane so hard into the tarmac I'm surprised he didn't do it again. My mate, a pilot, was gripping the seat pretty hard once he saw the descent angle we were coming in on.
And don't be a dick - it's not racism. They undeniably have a policy of offering cheap flights then stacking non-obvious charges on top - for checking in, for oxygen, for luggage, and now potentially to take a piss (a Ryanair field of expertise). Never again.
Actually, I've been on 10 flights in the past 3 weeks, and 12 before that this year! Last year, 43 flights!
Taxes tend to make up a large portion of any short flight, and with budget airlines they tend to be more than the fare itself - at least, that has been the case in my experience. Maybe I'm just flying to/from all the wrong places!
RyanAir's business model is based on the Texan airline SouthWest which flies some truly terrifyingly brightly-coloured planes across most of the US. Cheap and cheerful - with an emphasis on the cheerful. Compared to every other domestic airline in the US, SouthWest is a breath of fresh air - nice, clean planes, great staff and reasonable fares.
RyanAir on the other hand...
Oh and another huge thumbs up for Eire O'Flot ;)
Ryanair generally flies to non-established airports (usually ex-military bases) in the middle of nowhere which have minimal passenger charges. Of course, this often means that you can add at least an hour to your journey time each way (two hours if you think Hahn is anywhere near Frankfurt or Girona near Barcelona).
Not that that is why they use such airports, they do it because their charges are usually next to nothing. Occasionally they run loss-leaders where they absorb the charges for passengers or they strongarm local and regional authorities into waiving the charges.
And while I despise Ryanair, "low-cost" carriers have played an important role in democratising international travel in Europe. And apart from the environmental cost this is a good thing.
I fear that if you choose to fly with a carrier such as Ryanair you must expect behaviour such as this.
I have found them to be more expensive that British Airways on some flights when you take account of the "hidden extras".
If there is a problem, and there often is, it is almost impossible to contact Ryanair, and they care little for their passengers.
Avoid them like the plague...
Ryanair is now a serious security risk to World Aviation.
Ryanair.com - Passenger can check-in online for one of both of their flights from 15 days.
Part of the check-in is the security questions - Could anyone have interfered with your baggage? How can anyone truthfully answer that question 15 days before the flight?
(one could argue the questions are outdated, but as flight prices get cheaper, there are more morons flying than ever before, and the chances of one of them being duped is higher than ever)
I was most amused when asked by email to "Check in" and print my boarding card 15 days before the flight.
How can you answer the "Have you packed your bags yourself" and "Has anyone tampered with your bags" questions, 15 days before you fly, and probably 14 days before you even pack the bags?
I honestly can't see why we all have such a huge problem with Ryanair's charges! For a start, every single one of their charges is optional (yes even the online check-in one).
A quick 20-minute scan of their website will tell you that if you have a visa electron card, are somehow capable of spending two hours without a slap-up meal and a glass of wine and print out your ticket properly, you will need to pay no more than than the advertised price.
Having just returned from Milan Bergamo for a hefty fee of £20 return, I can honestly say that the £40-50 saving I made more than made up for my having to listen to a fanfare on arrival! So as I am sitting drinking my glass of vino rosso with my freshly-made Italian pizza, I toast Ryanair for paying for my meal and give myself a hearty pat on the back for actually making an effort to dodge through the loopholes.
As for all those people who say they don't wish to be treated like a nuisance - all I can say is stop taking yourself so seriously that you actually need to give a damn whether the hostess flashes her gnashers at you, Personally, I'm quite comfortable with my own company and the couple of seconds of interaction with staff hardly makes or breaks my flight.
Still, for as long as there are enough dozy morons out there to keep paying the add-ons, I will continue to get incomparably cheap flights all over Europe .
O'Leary may not have the highest moral standard, but if I can get from A to B for a tenner, why should I care? I don't imagine the CEO's of BA are exactly charitable saints themselves.
The proof of the proverbial pudding is that I have not flown with any airline other than RA in the last five years without a single problem and I don't envisage flying with any other in the next five. Viva la Ryanair!
Time to have some fun, methinks:
@ Effortless: question for anyone with time:
Could anyone with time do me a favour and fill this in:
http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/member/how_to_become_a_record_breaker.aspx
@ Why don't you people do research?:
Because it doesn't appear to beat personal experience.. Besides, nobody knows if you're not a closet masochist which may wrap your view ever so slightly..
Read my post, what are you a Swine Air sockpuppet?????? A one way 'free' flight within Ireland costs €30.
In fact, why don't you follow your own advice and do some fucking research of your own, in cae you can't find here's whats on the Lying Air web shite "MANDATORY ONLINE CHECK-IN REQUIRED FOR ALL NEW BOOKINGS MADE FROM 21ST MAY 2009 ONWARDS ", if my memory serves me, it used to be €15 to check in at the airport.
Tux, nearest icon to a sockpuppet
I have never used web check-in, for 2 main reasons, one of which makes it very difficult for me to do so if I have to.
1. Most airlines don't allow you to reserve the seats with extra leg room online, without paying an excessive fee. Whereas tall people like me who turn up at the check-in counter and clearly need the extra leg room usually get given the seat for no extra charge.
2. I don't own a printer since I rarely print anything. So even if I did check in online, it's difficult for me to print it.
I also hate flying Ryanair, since none of their seats have any leg room anyway.
What a daft comment! There is no excuse for that amount of downtime.
Retailers wouldn’t dream of closing a high street store on a trading day. When it comes to online retailing the situation shouldn’t be any different, especially given the amount of money people now part with on retail sites. When Sainsbury’s website went down over a three day period last year the supermarket giant lost £700,000 each day in missed sales.
With such high figures involved, it’s important organisations selling online take every possible step to avoid downtime. Flexible software technology that intelligently manages web traffic is readily available to help businesses address this challenge so there’s no longer an excuse for downtime or slow levels of service, even when essential maintenance work needs to be completed.
Some of us need more luggage than will fit in one carry-on bag. That's the sort of foolish extravagance that means we can't get the standard price (plus tax / airport charges).
Besides, electron cards are being phased out right left and centre - mine was "upgraded" some time ago...
Jeez, I thought that posts at el-reg were moderated? What's with the thinly veiled anti-Irish comments posted by some d1ckh3ads?
Get used to it buddies, this is the world of budget <insert service> pricing.
How many of you work for IT firms where you low ball the cost of a gig and plan to hit the customer up for extra cash for 'Changes' to the original scope once you get the business? Have you looked at the extras your bank charges you recently?
Fark me, just don't fly with budget airlines if you feel that strongly about it, but lay off the anti-Irish comment bozos.
The only Irishman these comments are against is Michael O'Leary. I doubt many of the commenters here would stoop to insulting the Irish nation by associating it with that feck-awful airline. It's a bit like using Trabant to represent German engineering.
Nice work on the oil price hedging too, by the way. Bought at $140 per barrel did they? Ouch.
I have to say, I actually like Ryanair ... I find the "in time" record absolutely remarkable and staff most of the time very nice and friendly, we should definitely gratitude this things, as well as that a trip from Cork (ireland) to London return for € 65 (paid) is actually very good value for money ... what puzzles me is the way the management tries, time and time again, to dismember a good public relation ship (with passengers as well as with staff) ... and that started as early as 1997 with Ryanairs "one millionth passenger" debacle and probably won't end with Michael O'Learys extremely disrespectful remarks towards Ryanairs pilots ... I don't get it ... there is a business, based on people, but their policies seem not to care about people at all ... and, although Mr.O'Leary makes fantastic and exciting political speeches, communication itself seems at a rock bottom low ...Yet they got rid of that awful yellow aircraft interior, therefore my hopes are up and I can't imagine why they shouldn't be able to change their peoples policies as well.
Cheers Erwin